Since they went to the wildcard format in baseball, in the past 21 years, only the 1998 & 1999 Yankees, and the 2005 White Sox, have won World Series rings while losing two games or less during their post-season run. (’99 Yanks and ’05 Chisox lost one. ’98 Yanks lost two.) With a win tonight, Cleveland can join the club.

At the major league level, the Yankees have Gardner, Ellsbury and Hicks in the outfield next year. (Yeah, for some stupid reason, they love Hicks.)

However, they also have Aaron Judge, Clint Frazier and Tyler Austin very close in the wings. (I say Austin expecting Bird to play first.) And, there’s more outfielders very close and knocking on the door. You’ve got Dustin Fowler, Mark Payton…and maybe even Mason Williams or Billy McKinney (although I am not too high on the latter two). And, don’t discount Blake Rutherford being a fast mover.

I know the Yankees would love to unload Ellsbury. But, that’s not going to happen.

This is actually a pretty cool Fall Classic match-up. Maybe the most interesting in a while.

Of course, the Cubs are STACKED. And, everyone wants them to win because it’s been since 1908, they have a curse, etc. Then again, the Indians have their thing with 1948 as well.

Don’t discount Cleveland.

Boston was better than them. Ditto Toronto. And, they beat them both. Francona just may be the best post-season manager in baseball history – at least in modern-day baseball history.

I would not be annoyed if either team won. I suppose that I am rooting for the Indians because they are the Cinderella team and it’s more than likely they won’t get too many other shots – whereas the Cubs may be great for a while.

Hopefully, it will be a great series. We had a pretty good one in 2014. But, I want this one to be better. Something along the lines of 1975 or 2001 would be nice. Even the level of 2011 or 1997 would be cool. Give us something memorable…

In any event, the next 12 months in Yankeeland are the best possible time to finally get rid of Brian Cashman. If it doesn’t happen during that time, it’s probably not going to happen until the 2020’s. (Ugh!)

For the LAST FOUR years, the Yankees have been an 85 win team. (The record speaks for itself – 85, 84, 87 and 84 is an average of 85, on the nose.)

If they pull another 85 or less, that may be enough to send Cashman packing. You don’t have to pay a GM what the Yankees are paying Cashman to get an 85 win team. For sure, if they tank and put up a losing record, that should be “Bye-bye Brian!”

But, if the Yankees do win less than 86 games in 2017, it’s probably the end for Joe Girardi as well. And, that would be sad. He’s a good man and a solid manager. In fact, if not for him, the Yankees would be more like a 79 win team each of the last four seasons. If anything, Girardi has saved Cashman’s bacon since 2013.

WWHD? (What would Hal do?)

If Yankee ownership had to choose between Cashman or Girardi to take the hit for a poor 2017, which one would get whacked?

I suspect it would be Joe.

Cashman, Trost and Levine have themselves dug in deeper than an Alabama tick and are super insulated. Plus, they have unity and Girardi is a man on an island.

Cashman survived Meanwell. In fact, he had her “taken care of” faster than you can say “Vincent Foster.”

Something big has to happen in the next 12 months to free Yankeeland of Cashman. Bigger than Carl Pavano, Kei Igawa or Javy Vazquez. Worse than Stephen Drew, Jacoby Ellsbury, Travis Hafner, Garrett Jones or Kevin Youkilis. It can’t just be another Cito Culver, Ty Hensley, C.J. Henry or Andrew Brackman. Cashman has proven none of that stuff sticks.

I don’t know…what do you think it would take? And, if it happened, would it be Girardi or Cashman who would be let go when it happens?

At the VERY LAST MINUTE, my son and I decided to go to the Yankees game yesterday. That’s us in the green box, above. (Click on the image to enlarge it.) It was our first time at the Stadium in a while. (We didn’t go at all last year.)

He had nothing to do and was bored. It was Game 161 on a gray day. They were giving out bobble-heads. And, the seats were $25 each on StubHub. I figured it would be easy getting in and out, etc. So, why not?

By the way, they “announced” the “paid” attendance at 33,222. Boy, that’s magic. Every section was at least half empty, or more, and there were a few sections that were totally empty. What did they have, like 13,000 who bought tickets and didn’t show? Really?

Anyway, what I found interesting was that the seats we had, while nice, did not give you the whole view of the field. We could not see anything in right field. Basically, any ball hit towards right that was more than 200 feet, we had to guess what happened based on the crowd reaction or the runners on base.

I think those tickets go for $50 each at full price. For that amount, shouldn’t you be able to see the whole field?